Security and human rights observers to close South Ossetia mission

EU monitors at a checkpoint in the Russian buffer zone next to South Ossetia. Photograph: Nodar Tskhvirashvili/Reuters

Europe's biggest security and human rights watchdog is to be forced out of Georgia after Russia today vetoed an extension of its mandate.

The Organisation for Security and Co-operation in Europe (OSCE), which has been active in the former Soviet state since 1992 and continued operations after the war over South Ossetia this summer, must begin withdrawing its 200 personnel and 28 observers from 1 January.

The Vienna-based group is made up of 56 countries from Europe, Central Asia and North America, and operates by consensus, meaning just one country can block a decision.

Russia, a member of the OSCE, was the only country today to vote down a proposal to extend the OSCE's mission in Georgia for another year. Diplomats said the veto reflected Moscow's contempt for the watchdog, which it sees as a western-manipulated body employed to weaken Russia.

The Kremlin recognised South Ossetia as independent in August after a conflict erupted there between Georgian forces and a coalition of Ossetian irregulars and the Russian army. Moscow now says the OSCE should set up a separate mission to operate in "independent" South Ossetia, rather than try to cover it under a Georgian umbrella.

Speaking after the talks in Vienna, Antti Turunen of Finland, the OSCE chairman, told reporters it had been impossible to reach a compromise. "We had one side defending the territorial integrity of Georgia and the other the 'independence' of South Ossetia," he said. "The sides are so far apart it made no sense trying to bridge the gap before 31 December."

He said talks to salvage the mission, possibly in a different format, would continue, even as the OSCE withdrawal went ahead.

Russia's ambassador to the organisation, Anvar Azimov, said it was impossible to extend the mandate in its current format because it would be "illegal" under the Russian law that recognises South Ossetia as an independent state.

The Kremlin has a history of bad blood with the OSCE, which has often criticised elections in Russia as rigged. Since the conflict in South Ossetia observers from the organisation have not been allowed into the Russia-backed breakaway ­republic, which under international law is still part of Georgia.

About 200 EU ceasefire monitors operating in Georgia will not be affected by the OSCE withdrawal.